hello everyone new to the forum and good to be here, I have been watching the progress of Erika and noticed that she is in eastern Africa, where i understand she wintered last year. I just wondered if anyone knew if this was the normal wintering area for baltic state ospreys? as nearly all scottish birds and a finnish male being monitored at present have made their way to west Africa. Thanks

hello everyone new to the forum and good to be here, I have been watching the progress of Erika and noticed that she is in eastern Africa, where i understand she wintered last year. I just wondered if anyone knew if this was the normal wintering area for baltic state ospreys? as nearly all scottish birds and a finnish male being monitored at present have made their way to west Africa. Thanks

Welcome, neilly!We have only few knowledge about wintering areas of Ospreys from Baltic countries. In Estonia have been tagged three Ospreys, one of these (juvenile) has not survived up to migration and two Erika and Maria winter(ed) in very different places, far from each other. Though they bred in neighbour nests, 2,5km from each other... Maybe our population (at least breeding ones in NE Estonia), they belong to bigger Russian population, but not to the Scandinavian one. In western Estonia, there are breeding very few pairs of Osprey, but hopefully they will increase.Think Erikas wintering site(s) are simply one sample of wide range.

Some short stories about Granes are inserted to Estonian version of OMM (online migration map).

Crane specialists of Europe will gather next week in Stralsund, NE Germany, for to discuss about European Crane census, maybe there are somewhere materials about presentations and then there should be also five presentations from Estonian Crane specialists (Aivar Leito, Ivar Ojaste, etc)...

Crane who flew to Turkey brings surprising new information for ChristmasNow it has been proved that young cranes can manage their first trip to the south on their own. The young cranes who were equipped with satellite transmitters on their backs in July and August, to allow their migration to be monitored, have made the best possible Christmas gift to our ornithologists by providing a great number of new facts that certainly were unexpected to the bird investigators.

Of the three crane youngsters – Juula, Ahja and Rasina – the last-named has offered the scientists the most excitement. To start with Rasina made the crane specialists raise surprised eyebrows when it turned out that this young crane set course on Turkey quite alone; she has been moving around there since October.

Ornithologist Alar Leito from the University of Life Sciences in Tartu, who keeps a watchful eye on the movements of our cranes notes that until now it has been considered as a fact that young cranes make their first autumn migration to the south together with their parents, and in a flock with other cranes. „The flocks of cranes usually don’t break up until just before the spring migration. But now it turns out that it may also be otherwise and the actual migraton model for for cranes has become much more complicated.”, Alvar Leito explained. The fact that Rasina made the migration journey on her own has been confirmed by bird-watchers in Ukraine as well as in Turkey who have travelled to observe and photograph the lonely bird in her whereabouts

Unexpected wintering location In addition to the fact that thanks to Rasina it was confirmed for the first time that cranes can fly to the south successfully on their own already in their first year, much excitement has been created among experts by the individual and instinctive choice of migration path. „The migration pathways of cranes have always run straight across the Black Sea, from the Crimea to Turkey, and from there on to the south: thus across central and eastern Turkey. Rasina however arrived at the western edge of Istanbul from the Odessa area in the Ukraine, moving along the western shore of the Black Sea; this path has never been observed before”, Alvar Leito told us. „All current data prove that a young crane can migrate on its own just by following its inner instinct, because Rasina flew in a straight line from Odessa to near Istanbul, that is, to the south.”

To top it all comes the fact that Rasina has remained in Turkey. Until now none of our Estonian or the Finnish cranes have been known to winter in Turkey, they have only passed through there.

If Rasina is going to spend Christmas in the Bilecki county near Istanbul, then Juula and Ahja – coming from Aivar Leito’s own home area, Elistvere – have made a preliminary stop in Croatia. Aivar Leito believes that if the weather there too becomes wintry they will set course towards Tunisia, going across the Mediterranean and the „boot” of Italy.

Crane who flew to Turkey brings surprising new information for ChristmasNow it has been proved that young cranes can manage their first trip to the south on their own. The young cranes who were equipped with satellite transmitters on their backs in July and August, to allow their migration to be monitored, have made the best possible Christmas gift to our ornithologists by providing a great number of new facts that certainly were unexpected to the bird investigators.

Of the three crane youngsters – Juula, Ahja and Rasina – the last-named has offered the scientists the most excitement. To start with Rasina made the crane specialists raise surprised eyebrows when it turned out that this young crane set course on Turkey quite alone; she has been moving around there since October.

Ornithologist Alar Leito from the University of Life Sciences in Tartu, who keeps a watchful eye on the movements of our cranes notes that until now it has been considered as a fact that young cranes make their first autumn migration to the south together with their parents, and in a flock with other cranes. „The flocks of cranes usually don’t break up until just before the spring migration. But now it turns out that it may also be otherwise and the actual migraton model for for cranes has become much more complicated.”, Alvar Leito explained. The fact that Rasina made the migration journey on her own has been confirmed by bird-watchers in Ukraine as well as in Turkey who have travelled to observe and photograph the lonely bird in her whereabouts

Unexpected wintering location In addition to the fact that thanks to Rasina it was confirmed for the first time that cranes can fly to the south successfully on their own already in their first year, much excitement has been created among experts by the individual and instinctive choice of migration path. „The migration pathways of cranes have always run straight across the Black Sea, from the Crimea to Turkey, and from there on to the south: thus across central and eastern Turkey. Rasina however arrived at the western edge of Istanbul from the Odessa area in the Ukraine, moving along the western shore of the Black Sea; this path has never been observed before”, Alvar Leito told us. „All current data prove that a young crane can migrate on its own just by following its inner instinct, because Rasina flew in a straight line from Odessa to near Istanbul, that is, to the south.”

To top it all comes the fact that Rasina has remained in Turkey. Until now none of our Estonian or the Finnish cranes have been known to winter in Turkey, they have only passed through there.

If Rasina is going to spend Christmas in the Bilecki county near Istanbul, then Juula and Ahja – coming from Aivar Leito’s own home area, Elistvere – have made a preliminary stop in Croatia. Aivar Leito believes that if the weather there too becomes wintry they will set course towards Tunisia, going across the Mediterranean and the „boot” of Italy.

I am glad that this satellite tracking has proved so helpful for the orthinoligists.Now we wait for more,please.

_________________Carmel a member of SHOW .. I hope you love birds too. Its economical. It saves going to heaven.Emily Dickinson

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